Words contain power. Our world revolves around words. We think in words. They are EVERYWHERE! Think about this: an idea is only as good as the words used to convey it. So you may have the best, most profound idea, but if you don't know how to say or write it, then your message won't come out right. How critical this is in marketing!

Essentially, marketing is promoting messages that contain emotion that spur the beholders to an action.  Take the emotion out of the message and you have news. Take the call to action out of the message and you have reading. Successful marketers know that if they can get their viewers to feel sad, happy, angry, nostalgic, restless, or inspired, they have won half the battle. The other half is pointing the viewers to an outlet for the emotion they are feeling. For example, the animal abuse non-profit commercials on TV are all targeted for viewers to mourn for the sad-eyed puppy. Then, with all these strong emotions pent up inside, you are asked to send a check to the address on screen and you do it, because you want to rescue the animals with which you were just enraptured. That's marketing

Well, it's easy to succeed in marketing with photos and videos and music. What if you only had WORDS. Just plain old text.Things get a little more challenging. Now is the perfect time to introduce to you the BIG THREE of black and white marketing: vocabulary, diction, and sentence structure.  

1. Vocabulary is the word bank from which you draw to put your idea into  communicative material. The bigger your bank, the richer you are, the more interesting your idea will sound, the more captured your audience will be.

2. Diction is picking the best, most effective words together to grasp exactly what you are thinking. If you use this well, the beholder will feel the same emotion you felt when you first thought of the idea.

3. Sentence structure is piecing the the words together to form the message masterpiece. Short sentences are shocking, sudden, violent and fast. Long sentences are persuasive, consuming, loaded, and informative. Like a good craft beer and a well cultured cheese, they pair will together!  

So next time you are writing for social media, an ad, a product description, or an "About" section for your business, remember the BIG THREE of black and white marketing and watch your words work wonders to win your customers.